Experts Say

How I learned to hate the Bomb

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
February 7, 2017
By Joelien Pretorius

The proposed nuclear weapon ban treaty might seem to have a lot in common with nuclear arms control. Both approaches, after all, acknowledge that nuclear weapons are dangerous. Both seek to reduce the number of nuclear weapons in the world. But the truth is that arms control and the ban treaty imbue nuclear weapons with very different meanings. The result is that only one approach—the ban treaty—has any hope of leading to general nuclear disarmament.